


Palimpsest

by Jintian



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-09-01
Updated: 2001-09-01
Packaged: 2017-10-29 20:26:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/323845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jintian/pseuds/Jintian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The aspects beneath the surface.  Post-"One Son."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Palimpsest

  
By the time they got there, the bodies had already burnt to the nightmare figures of his memory from Ruskin Dam, black and shriveled, barely recognizable as human. Some were still smoking, and the stench of charred flesh was everywhere, seeping even through the closed windows of the car. Mulder stared out at the massacre, a furious wind rushing through his head.

They'd had trouble getting through the gate at first, but the soldier at the post was green and scared -- roused out of bed as a replacement, it seemed. They could see now where all the others had gone. Military men moved through the hangar with bewildered faces, their guns holstered and useless as they followed orders they didn't understand.

A pale-faced major wearing a headset marched up as they got out of the car, demanding to know who they were and just how the hell they'd gotten onto the base.

Skinner and Scully whipped out their badges with equal amounts of bristle. Mulder just stood and stared, half-supported by the car.

The major braced in front of him. "Where's yours?"

"Mulder," Scully said. He could feel her gaze laser onto him.

The hangar was a wasteland, the dry and withered landmarks scattered like forgotten refuse. He felt a pulse of pain in his temple, thinking _Diana_ thinking _I told her to go ahead, I told her to go_

Finally his hand drifted into his pocket and withdrew his FBI identification. The major took it and stalked to the front headlights to read their names into his mouthpiece.

Mulder blinked. He pulled out his cell phone, had already dialed Diana's number and gotten an out-of-service message when the major came hustling back. "No cell phones," he barked. "We'll have the whole goddamn media banging down our doors."

"Turn it off, Mulder," Skinner growled.

Mulder held the hand with the phone in front of his chest, his eyes wide and staring.

"Mulder," Scully said again.

No response.

"Did you hear me?" the major barked. He shoved the badges at Skinner and started to push past.

Scully darted forward and took the phone from Mulder, thumbing it off. She flashed the dark display at the major and then slipped it into her pocket, glaring at him. "Problem solved."

He looked at her down the length of his nose. "Not quite. I want all three of you debriefed on exactly why you're here. Let's go."

"The bodies," Mulder muttered, and the major turned to him, mouth twisting. Mulder pushed on anyway, even though Scully's hand on his arm was silencing. "Did you...identify...?"

The major countered with a question. "Do you know who any of them would be?"

"Diana," Mulder said. "Diana Fowley." Scully's hand dropped.

Narrowed eyes. "And just who is that?"

Skinner broke in, his voice like sandpaper. "She's a Special Agent with the Bureau. And that's all you need to know."

"Wrong," the major said. "I'm going to find out a lot more than that. Let's go."

*

The night slid by the car windows. Mulder was turned toward the back windshield, watching the road uncurl behind them. He had a feeling he'd lost something.

"What did they ask you?" Scully said in the passenger seat.

Skinner gave a derisive grunt. "They basically wanted to know if anyone at the Bureau sent us. They said they'd be in contact about what kind of 'sensitive information' they'd allow us to give testimony on, should we choose to open an investigation."

"Are we choosing to do that?"

The AD was quiet for a moment. "Aren't we going to have to?"

Their voices faded, receding down a black tunnel of echoes. Mulder blinked at the lack of sound, then moved to sit in the middle of the backseat. It smelled like leather, cold air and leather. He kept his lower body very still, but he let his hands wander over the seatbelts and the doors. Skinner had activated the childproof locks.

Then they were pulling into the Potomac Yard where Mulder and Scully had met up earlier that night. Mulder's car sat in dignified silence under a huge light fixture. He remembered hers was crushed on the train tracks. It would most likely still be there in the morning, he mused, inspecting the thought like a Christmas ornament.

She muttered a brief, "Thank you for the ride, sir," to the AD, and turned to look back at Mulder.

"You still want to take him home?" Skinner asked. "I don't mind doing it myself."

Mulder raised his head, realizing the other man was eyeing him in the rearview mirror.

"No, I'll take him," Scully said. "I'll need to take his car anyway." She opened the passenger door to get out, but the AD's words stopped her again.

"Be prepared for the Bureau's inquiries on Monday. We may have gotten around the major back there but you'd better have your story straight for the FBI."

She nodded. "Yes, sir. Let's go, Mulder."

Then she was out, shutting her door and opening his. Mulder moved like a man underwater, unbuckling his seat belt and stumbling to his feet.

"Give me your keys," she said, as soon as he was standing. He fished in his pockets and put them in her palm, not meeting her eyes.

She strode to his car, heels clicking on the asphalt. His own movements were slow, like he was trying to walk through molasses. She already had the ignition turned on by the time he cleared the hood of Skinner's car.

The clock on his dashboard showed 2:48 in glowing green numbers as she sped out of the parking lot ahead of Skinner. Mulder settled himself into the passenger seat, knees drawn up, and let his head hang.

They did not speak, and when he looked up again she was parking the car in front of her apartment building.

*

Scully put him in the spare bedroom. She watched as he dropped heavily onto the bed, not even bothering to shrug out of his jacket.

Then she bent in front of him. "Mulder, I'm sorry." She paused, still looking at him. "Do you really think Diana might have been one of the victims?"

He studied his knees, his hands large against the cloth of his pants.

She sighed and straightened. After a moment she came back with a blanket and a glass of water. She draped the blanket around his shoulders and coaxed him into taking a swallow from the glass. "Mulder," she said. "You're in shock. Can you hear me?"

He closed his eyes, nodding.

He heard her sigh again, then felt her small hands removing his shoes, easing him back so that he lay horizontal on the thin quilt of the bed. She pulled the blanket over him, tucking it around his chest and legs.

Mulder shivered.

"I'll be back to check on you," she said. Then as he lay there he could hear her movements in the other rooms. She checked her answering machine, drank something in the kitchen, and turned her bathroom shower on. Mulder drifted, listening to the pounding of water against tile.

*

He came awake into sudden silence, the light still on in the room, and he had the sudden conviction that he was the last man alive on earth. Everyone else had burned. Everyone else had become cinder and ashes.

Diana, Skinner, his mother. Scully.

Scully burned at Ruskin Dam in Pennsylvania, her luminous skin black and powdery from the alien fire.

He panted, heaving himself up from the bed, feeling his way toward the hall. Her bedroom door was across the way, open, and he half-fell, half-crashed into it, landing painfully on his shoulder.

She jumped from where she had been kneeling in front of a dresser drawer, hitching her towel back up from where it had fallen to her hips. He caught a glimpse of the wet skin of her back, brilliant-colored snake eating its own tail just before she managed to cover herself.

 _not that it makes any difference_ he thought _not when I've already seen_

"Mulder, what the --"

She hurried over to him and knelt where he lay helpless on the floor.

"Mulder, are you hurt?" Her hands roved over him, searching for injury, and he pawed the air in her direction like an overturned turtle. He could smell her, not burned at all but rather strong bath scents, clean and fresh.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd been this close to her, it was so long ago.

"Scuh --" he tried to say.

Satisfied he was uninjured, she helped him to his feet. "Why didn't you stay in bed? I told you I'd check on you."

He didn't answer, but swayed toward her, clutching her bare wet shoulder with his hand.

She stumbled back under his weight, turning so that he could land on her bed. "Okay, sit here. Just let me get dressed."

But he didn't let go of her, instead grasping her arm in a death grip, falling back against her pillows and bringing her with him. "Stay," he rasped, and shivered at the sound of his own voice. "Tell me I'm not alone."

She sat on the edge, her toweled hip pressed to his. "Mulder, you're not alone. I'm here."

He shook his head. "Burned," he muttered. "Burned, I know." His hands flew along her collarbone, up and down her arms, searching her skin.

"Mulder, I'm not," she said softly. "You'll be okay after some rest."

She rose so that he dropped his hands, tucking her towel more securely around her.

After a moment, she said, "Do you want to sleep here?"

He swallowed. "Please."

She began to unbutton his shirt. He closed his eyes, feeling her separate the cloth, remembered other hands that had done this for him. "Diana," he whispered.

Scully paused, her fingers stilled on the buttons. "I'm sure we'll find out soon."

He shook his head again. "No."

"What?" she murmured, guiding him up so she could take the shirt completely off. She moved to undo his pants and slide them down his hips. Her hair dropped bits of perfumed water on his undershirt, and his fingers wandered up from his side to touch the wetness.

Scully's scent was an ancient memory, the kind written in his bones but only remembered during certain atmospheric conditions, like arthritis with rain in the air. Wetness seeped through his lashes. "Scully," he choked, "we have to save the ones we love."

She pulled away, and he would have reached after her if his arms hadn't suddenly felt so heavy. Through his closed eyes he heard her opening and shutting drawers, the whisper of clothes being pulled on. "You couldn't have known something like that was going to happen, Mulder," she sighed. "You thought you were saving us."

He made a sound like a door opening against tired hinges. He heard her coming back to the bed and felt its weight shift as she sat down beside him again. Her hand on his forehead was cool.

Mulder tilted his head back, trying to catch her palm with his lips. But it was so dark behind his eyelids -- he couldn't see a thing. He'd been staring into night for so long he couldn't remember how to open them.

"Mulder," she sighed, lifting her hand. "You need to sleep."

"Will you stay?" he whispered.

Scully's hesitance was minuscule, but still there. "Okay." She got up to turn off the light. He sensed the room going dark through his eyelids, through the sound of her careful steps back to the bed. She got in, helping him under the covers with her. Her body was lithe and small next to his. He was all sprawl and angles. He resisted the urge to pull her close, though he couldn't have anyway for the weight of his limbs.

"Mulder," she murmured, "we'll find out what happened."

He swam in darkness, floating on the bed beside her with his eyes closed. "We already know. Ruskin Dam."

"You think it was the same thing that killed these people?"

"Yes. And killed...Diana, too."

Scully was silent for a moment. "Mulder, I'm sorry. I know she meant a lot to you."

The wetness was seeping faster between his eyelids, and he didn't know if it was tears or the pressure of him squeezing his eyes shut. "You don't understand, Scully."

She shifted, and her voice came out muffled. "Maybe that's because you don't tell me."

His lungs seemed to collapse at that. He could think of so many things untold, and so many things he would unsay as well. So much he wanted to do, if only his body would lighten enough to allow it. He waited for her to speak again, but she didn't.

Sleep claimed them eventually, the quiet evenness of breathing.

*

And he dreamed of Diana, leaning into him, her face coming closer and illuminated by golden light. He was struck by the utter familiarity of it, even though it had been so long, so many years since they had done this. She used to wrap her arms around him on those nights of furious profiling, quieting the monsters in his head. He would come home with stubble on his jaw, hungry and too tired to sleep. She would sit him down on the bed and embrace him before drawing off his clothes with gentle hands, so he could lie there with at least some physical comfort.

Despite the vague feeling of -- _Scully_ \-- guilt, he felt a stir in his belly. Arousal spiked through his groin, but before Diana could deepen the kiss he thought of Scully in his hallway, he thought of Antarctica and he broke away, enfolding her in a chaste embrace instead. Her perfume scent was everywhere, some new brand she had picked up since he'd seen her last, but underneath it he recognized that she still used the same soap, the same lotion.

Innocent as he wanted the dream to be, the images of Scully faded and he remembered married life. How he and Diana had crammed themselves into one small apartment, cabin fever ripping at the walls every few weeks or so, their angry shouting and angry sex tearing through the rooms. Diana had been younger then, her face fierce and vital and thrust forward to meet everything head on.

He woke with the force of trying to push the memories from his head. He lay next to Scully breathing warmly in the dark, and thought how she was like Diana in the early days of their partnership. Scully was still fierce years later, but now there was a hardness under her skin that left bruises if he came too close.

She shifted next to him in the bed and her voice drifted close to his ear. "Were you having a bad dream? You were making noises in your sleep."

"Oh," he whispered. "I'm sorry." He reached for her then, his hand spidering on her shoulder. Yes, she was hard, her bones not quite fitting against his palm. "I'm sorry, Scully. I'm sorry about everything."

"Mulder, it's okay," she said softly. "It's all right."

She said the words again when his mouth found her collarbone, and again when his hand wandered down to her breast.

*

A blare of noise broke the morning open and he snapped awake. Beside him, Scully rotated in the sheets and fumbled for the phone. "Hello?" Her voice was swollen with sleep. Then she sat up. "Agent Fowley? Where are you?"

Blood lurching, Mulder turned toward her, his eyes wide.

"We were extremely worried. Look, Mulder's here." Scully gave him the receiver, gently as if it were an egg.

"Diana?" he croaked.

"Fox. Thank God you're all right." Yes, it was her voice, sounding worried like it did whenever he would come home late. But that wasn't right, somehow. He was the one who was supposed to be worried about _her_.

"What happened?" he asked.

"Nothing -- I went to the air force base like you said but they wouldn't let me past the gates. I tried your cell phone but you'd turned it off."

His memory swirled. "I did have it off."

"Then this morning I got a call from Assistant Director Skinner -- he said there was a fire and you thought I'd -- so I got him to give me Scully's number --"

"But you're okay. You weren't hurt." He let the words anchor in his mind, slowing the tailspin of his thoughts.

"Yes, I'm okay. I was never in danger." Diana's voice had gone soft, smoothed into comforting tones.

Something was odd here, something slippery he couldn't put a finger on. He felt it moving around his head and refusing to settle. "That's good," he said, and repeated it. "That's good." He looked over at Scully, met her unblinking eyes and wondered what was behind them.

"We have a lot to talk about, Fox," Diana was saying. "We should meet."

"Okay," he said slowly. "When?"

"This afternoon. I'll come to your apartment."

"Okay," he said again. "I'll see you then."

He handed the phone back to Scully and she hung it up.

"Is Agent Fowley all right?"

Mulder nodded. "Yes." He pondered the word.

"Good, I'm glad."

He turned his head to look at her, noticing suddenly how close she was, how much she smelled like sleep and the warmth their bodies had created together under the covers.

But she dropped her gaze away from his and slid out of bed. "I'll go make us some breakfast," she said stiffly. "You can use the shower in a minute."

She was gone then, locked inside the bathroom. He stretched his arm out over the smooth bottom sheet and touched the space she had just occupied, letting his fingers move through the remnants of her heat.

*

"You can just drop me off," Scully told Mulder as he pulled into the rental car dealership.

"Are you sure?" he asked, surprised. "I don't mind."

"I'll be fine, Mulder. You should go home and get some more rest." Her hand hovered over his arm. "Give me a call if...if anything happens."

"Okay."

He guided the car to the curb and Scully let herself out. He watched her walk into the building, waiting until she disappeared from view before moving. Then he drove himself back to his apartment and sat on his couch, following the mute moving colors on his TV as he chewed stale bread and peanut butter.

The knock came at two o'clock.

Diana was dressed for winter, long black coat hiding her body as she leaned up to hug him. "I was so worried," she whispered into his neck.

He let his arms encircle her, wondering briefly at how she seemed to be echoing inside him, as if there were nothing for her to move in but empty space. He'd thought she was dead, and yet here she was, smoothing the shirt over his back with her hands.

He wasn't sure if he would have to break the embrace first, but then she stepped back and looked up at him. Her eyes were dark, and he forgot his suspicions for a moment. This was Diana. Diana who had been the one to find this apartment, who had vowed fierce support when he discovered the X-files, who had said "Yes" with the same expression she wore now when he asked her to marry him.

"Do you want to come in?" he asked.

She nodded and he led her over to the couch. She perched on the edge of it, studying the apartment. "You haven't changed much."

"You missed the years when I didn't have a bedroom."

She raised her eyebrows. "You didn't use it?"

Mulder shook his head. "I stopped sleeping in there after you left. But my couch was enough."

He watched her take that information in, processing it the way she always did before she responded to something new. "So then you never..."

Even after the years that had separated them, he could still tell where her thoughts were. "No," he said. "I never dated. Not seriously."

"No one?"

"No one," he said, thinking of Scully and how she had moved beneath him.

"But you've been...reluctant to talk to me about the past."

Mulder realized he was still standing, and moved to sit in his desk chair. Her eyes followed him. "I know," he said slowly. "I guess I just didn't want to dredge all of it up again."

"And now?"

"And now I'm not sure." His palms were moist, and he rubbed them on his knees. "We do have a past, I can't deny that. But maybe I need to leave it behind. I mean, I thought you had, until you came back."

"Do you really believe that?" A ghost of a smile flitted across her face. "I thought letting go of the past was something you weren't capable of."

Old cruelties, old honesties, things that could only be said by someone who had loved him. He let her words wash over him, knowing she had not meant for them to hurt.

"Fox..." She sighed and stretched out her hand. "This is difficult for me. What I did...it was the worst mistake I ever made."

He was gentle with her, holding her fingers like pieces of delicate glass. "There are some mistakes you can't take back. Maybe you shouldn't take them back."

She shook her head. "I still love you. I thought, after last night..."

He could have said many things. He could have said something about love, about how it changed by the hour, how it was never the same thing twice. But she knew all of that already, she'd lived it with him. That was the problem -- it had been lived, past tense.

So he said only, "I'm sorry."

Diana never cried. It wasn't something she did, only three occasions in all the time he'd known her. She lifted her other hand and touched his mouth with her fingers. "I am, too." Then she stood, looking down at him.

"You'll be okay?" he asked. Suddenly he felt smaller than her, felt lost like he had after he believed her dead. She was always the stronger one.

She nodded, her hand dropping back to her side. "There was...something else I wanted to tell you," she said. "I talked to Jeffrey Spender this morning, after I spoke with you on the phone."

"About what?"

"His mother has disappeared again. And he thinks those deaths at El Rico were his fault."

Mulder sat back in the chair, stunned. He couldn't even summon up the familiar anger. "Why would he think that?"

She shook her head. "He wouldn't explain it to me. But he said he's going to recommend to Kersh and Skinner that you be put back on the X-Files. He said he was wrong about you both."

"Scully and me?"

Diana nodded again. "Yes. And...I agree. The files are yours, Fox. We were just intruding."

"But what are you going to do?"

That ghost of a smile again. "Well, I'd thought that if you...that if we.... But that doesn't look like it's going to happen. So I'm taking a leave of absence."

"You're leaving again." The words came out of him before he could swallow the thought and he winced. He didn't really have the right to condemn her actions anymore, did he? "For how long?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. But not forever, Fox. Not even for a very long time. And if you need me, I'll be there for you, as soon as I can."

Echoing, her voice, the way she was looking down at him. They were giving him the X-Files back. Him and Scully. Scully who hadn't said more then twenty words to him all morning.

"I should go," she said. She took a breath. "Goodbye, Fox." He smelled the swirl of her perfume as she leaned toward him, felt the cool pressure of her lips against his cheek.

He sat in the same place, thinking, long after Diana had left.

*

On Monday everything happened as she'd said it would, and when they went downstairs after the meeting in Kersh's office they found Jeffrey Spender shot dead in the basement.

Scully opened the door on the body, striding in and stepping straight in the puddle of blood before she realized what was different about the place. Her face drained of color as she whipped her head back to look at Mulder, standing thunderstruck in the doorway.

Later, they stood in the hallway as Spender was carried out in a body bag. Skinner, barking into a cell phone, tracked its progress down the dimly lit corridor. Scully watched the forensics team working inside the office, her expression set and almost sullen.

"Is this something we can't make personal?" she whispered to Mulder, who was hovering at her shoulder.

"What...?" Then he remembered.

 _personal interest is all I have_

She whipped around to face him, her eyes sharp and furious. "There was enough blood on my hands already, Mulder."

"Scully, I..." But he didn't know how to finish the sentence.

She stood there looking at him, and gradually the fury left her eyes until there was only disappointment. And that wasn't something that echoed in emptiness. That was something that went straight to the bottom of his chest, and stayed there.

*

Running, the hot ache of muscles and the burn of cold against flushed skin. Air seething in and out of his lungs, and it was good, goodness, good, to feel the stretching and tightening of his body, his feet pounding the pavement.

March was coming in like a lion, the clouds thunderous and bulky overhead. Mulder looked around the park and realized it was deserted, all the other Sunday afternoon people gone to seek cover. The sight of the empty trees and paths left him feeling like someone had pushed him down and disappeared before he could get up again.

He slowed to a walk, wiping sweat from his brow and fishing car keys from his sweatpants pocket.

Jeffrey Spender's funeral earlier that week had been short and sparsely populated. Mulder had positioned himself as far as possible from the casket, so he could study the surrounding faces. Scully and Skinner sat next to each other.

Diana sat in the inner row. She caught Mulder's gaze and gave him a small nod.

After the service he half-expected her to intercept him. As he pulled away from the car-lined curb he tried to catch a last glimpse of her, but she had disappeared into the moving forest of people.

On Friday he learned that she had processed the forms for her leave of absence and had departed DC. He spent most of the weekend staring at his silent phone until finally dragging himself out of the apartment for a run.

As he opened his car now he realized his cell phone was ringing. He leaned over the steering wheel to snatch it out of the glove compartment.

"Mulder."

"Mulder, it's me," Scully said. "Skinner just faxed us a couple more IDs on those bodies."

"Are you at the office? I'll drive over."

"Actually, I was just getting ready to leave. But I thought I'd call and let you know."

"You don't want to go over them together?"

"I have another meeting."

He almost asked her what meeting could be more important, but thought better of it. Her voice had a buttoned-up quality, had sounded like that the entire week. "Okay," he told her. "I'll see you on Monday then."

She disconnected without saying anything. The silence of the park crashed down on him again, and for a moment he just stood there, listening to it.

Sunday afternoon, with maybe twenty minutes before the storm would open the sky. Eventually he got into his car and started the ignition.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Alanna, Diana Battis and sophiahelix for being willing. Thanks to Galia and Melymbrosia for inquiring. Thanks to all the folks on Glass Onion who nailed.


End file.
